Wasim Akram names Late Martin Crowe as one who played him the best

Wasim Akram, the former Pakistani fast bowler is regarded as one of the greatest of all time. The left-arm pacer has been named by a lot of great batsmen as the most difficult bowler to bat against. Kumar Sangakkara, the second-highest run-scorer of ODIs recently named him along with Zaheer Khan as the most difficult bowler he has faced in his career. Now, the speedster himself has revealed which batsman, as per him, used to be most comfortable against him.

He had the ability to swing the ball both ways and to generate reverse swing when the ball got old. As Akram was a left-armer, the angle he used to generate also troubled a lot of established batsmen during his time. He, along with Waqar Younis, developed the deadly duo which troubled most batsman during the 90s. Pakistan was on the peak of their game and the credit went to the unparalleled fast-bowling attack the subcontinent team had.

“What’s your secret?” Wasim Akram asked Martin Crowe

The batsman who faced the southpaw the best during his peak, was none other than New Zealand great, Late Martin Crowe. In New Zealand’s tour of Pakistan in 1990, Akram played two Tests and picked up 10 wickets when his partner Waqar Younis picked up 29 wickets in 3 Tests. The Pakistani pacers were getting reverse swing just after 5-6 overs with the new ball and all the Kiwi batsmen were finding it troublesome to pick them apart from Crowe.

“I think the ball used to get reverse after five-six overs, don’t ask me why,” Akram said on Sky Sports. “It was against New Zealand and Waqar got 30 [29] wickets in three Test matches and I got 16 [10] in two and got injured. Martin Crowe got two hundred [one hundred] and I asked him after the series, ‘What’s your secret?’ He said, ‘I just try to play you on the front foot and I play for the in-swingers every time and the out-swingers automatically miss the edge.’”

The series was a complete disaster for the visiting team as they lost it by a margin of 0-3. The only batsman who had a decent run was Crowe as he scored 244 runs at an average of 61. His credentials can also be judged from the fact that the second-highest scorer had less than half of the runs as compared to him.